Zeitschrift für Kunst- und Sozialwissenschaften

Civil Disobedience, Moral Authority and Law

Abstract

Leopold RA

Civil disobedience is the violation of law in public that does not result in the loss of life or damage to property. The aim of civil disobedience is political change. John Rawls, Jurgen Habermas, Richard Rorty and Sheldon Wolin have separately differentiated civil disobedience; nevertheless they emphasize the “civil” dimension of civil disobedience over the “disobedience” one. This paper interrogates the “disobedience” dimension of civil disobedience and asks: (1) to what extent an individual may incite civil disobedience within a democratic state? And, (2) when does it become morally defensible to disobey a law? The paper reveals the Kantian associations, explains the relationship between morality and authority and moral authoritarianism, and analyses these concepts in terms of US law.